Oromerycidae

Oromerycidae is an extinct family of artiodactyls closely related to living camels, known from the early to late Eocene of western North America. Oromerycids were small both in terms of size and overall diversity, and most information on their anatomy relies on Eotylopus, which is known from a complete skeleton.

Oromerycidae

James St. John · CC BY 2.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
TylopodaPBDB
Diet
browserPBDB
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Artiodactyla

Time the record covers

At least 2.7 million years on record.

The record covers at least 39.7 Mya to 37 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 45.9 Mya to 33.9 Mya.

Eocene — about 77 of 77 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 0 of 77 occurrences46–46 Mya — about 3 occurrences46–45 Mya — about 4 occurrences45–45 Mya — about 4 occurrences45–44 Mya — about 4 occurrences44–44 Mya — about 4 occurrences44–43 Mya — about 4 occurrences43–43 Mya — about 4 occurrences43–43 Mya — about 4 occurrences43–42 Mya — about 4 occurrences42–42 Mya — about 4 occurrences42–41 Mya — about 4 occurrences41–41 Mya — about 4 occurrences41–40 Mya — about 4 occurrences40–40 Mya — about 4 occurrences40–39 Mya — about 3 occurrences39–39 Mya — about 2 occurrences39–39 Mya — about 2 occurrences39–38 Mya — about 2 occurrences38–38 Mya — about 2 occurrences38–37 Mya — about 2 occurrences37–37 Mya — about 2 occurrences37–36 Mya — about 2 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 2 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 2 occurrences36–35 Mya — about 2 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 2 occurrences35–34 Mya — about 2 occurrences34–34 Mya — about 2 occurrences39.7 Mya37 Mya46.4 Mya33.4 Mya

77 occurrences of Oromerycidae on record, most of them in the Eocene. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

77 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

16 formations

Sespe — 34.30°N, 119.00°WSantiago — 33.40°N, 117.51°WSantiago — 33.13°N, 117.29°WSantiago — 33.19°N, 117.32°WSantiago — 32.90°N, 117.10°WUinta — 40.07°N, 109.28°WUinta — 40.20°N, 109.90°WUinta — 40.07°N, 109.70°WWhite River — 43.20°N, 107.10°WWhite River — 40.80°N, 103.10°WFriars — 32.90°N, 117.10°WCypress Hills — 50.20°N, 107.60°WCypress Hills — 50.00°N, 107.90°WCypress Hills — 49.57°N, 109.88°WWagon Bed ("Tepee Trail") — 43.20°N, 107.10°WWagon Bed ("Tepee Trail") — 43.20°N, 108.20°WDevil's Graveyard — 29.90°N, 104.20°WWashakie — 40.60°N, 108.10°WWashakie — 41.70°N, 109.00°WMission Valley — 32.90°N, 117.10°WChadron — 45.47°N, 112.62°WChadron — 42.40°N, 103.80°WWagon Bed — 43.20°N, 108.20°WStadium — 32.78°N, 117.15°WPomerado — 32.92°N, 117.07°WRubio Peak — 33.43°N, 107.72°WBridger — 41.08°N, 110.10°W

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Oromerycidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 5 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Oromerycidae and its relatives

Eocene

Where Oromerycidae and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

661 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 63 sites for Oromerycidae, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

29 references

Each of the 77 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 16 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Oromerycidae

Credit
James St. John
Licence
CC BY 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Oromerycidae was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itTylopoda through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Gazin 1955